All About Siri

You may not believe it, but the iPhone 4S (and devices using the new iOS 6) comes equipped with a personal assistant. Its name is Siri, and your wish is literally its command. Siri understands your commands in plain English and will help you type a message, create a reminder, find a restaurant, and much more. It talks back too!

Let’s explore how to use Siri and unlock its extraordinary potential.

To begin, let’s make sure Siri is enabled.

From the home screen, select the Settings icon, followed by General, and Siri.

Make sure both the Siri switch and the Raise to Speak switch are set in the On position.

To summon Siri, hold down the home button for one second until you see the following and hear a tone.

Siri wants to know “What can I help you with?” If you tap the little i symbol, you will see a long list of some of Siri’s sample commands.

The best way to get an idea of how Siri works is by a few practice runs:

As you can see, you talk to Siri just as you would a person. If you ask a question that Siri doesn’t know, it performs a search to find out the answer.

One of my favorite things about Siri is that it is connected to WolframAlpha[1], a nifty fact database. For example:

Before I go, I want to share an alternative method to summon Siri. If you enabled “Raise to Speak,” you can simply lift your phone to your phone to your ear and wait for the tone. Then, say your command. This is ideal for discreet requests to Siri, when you are in a crowded atmosphere.

Finally, if you are looking for more information about Siri, view Apple’s FAQ[2].